Sui Mainnet Restarts After Nearly 6-Hour Halt Triggered by Software Bug

Sui's mainnet has resumed normal operations after a defect in its latest software release halted the network for about 5 hours and 55 minutes. Validators coordinated a fix and upgraded to a patched version, bringing checkpoint production back to normal on May 29. The issue was traced to Sui's 1.72 release, where a flaw in the gas-charging logic disrupted transaction fee calculation. With fee accounting broken, the network stopped processing new blocks. The disruption began on May 28, when validators running the 1.72 update hit the bug and checkpoint production ceased. With no new checkpoints, transactions could not be finalized and the chain effectively froze. Restoration required broad validator participation. Under Sui's consensus rules, validators representing more than two-thirds of staked tokens needed to move to the patched software before the chain could restart. Sui said its safety guarantees remained intact. No user funds were lost, and the network's design prevented data inconsistencies while the chain was stalled. DeFi applications on Sui were also effectively paused during the outage. Users could not adjust positions, trades did not execute, and liquidations could not occur. The incident adds to a growing list of extended disruptions in 2026. On January 14, Sui experienced another multihour stall of roughly 6 hours, attributed at the time to a consensus commit bug. Two outages of similar scale within about five months underscore a recurring pattern: defects introduced in updates followed by a time-consuming effort to coordinate validator upgrades. Market reaction was immediate. During the outage, SUI fell to around $0.89, a drop of roughly 68%, then partially rebounded once operations normalized. Sui markets itself as a high-throughput Layer 1 designed to support demanding DeFi use cases and, over time, attract institutional capital. Total value locked in the Sui ecosystem has climbed into the hundreds of millions of dollars since launch. For traders, the sharp selloff during the halt and the subsequent partial recovery may shape expectations for how the token could trade if another major interruption occurs.